My First Sketchbook

Sometimes the tidying up is just as fun as the mess making!

A Christmas Gift for a Lover of Dressing Up

I just discovered these beautiful animal headdresses by Sara Lowes at Animalesque via the Petit & Small blog. They come in kids and adult sizes and each one is beautifully hand made. Wouldn't they make an incredibly special gift for a lover of dressing up... I'll put one on your Christmas list Tess! 

A Christmas Gift for a Seamstress Mummy

 A lovely sewing pattern from Cali Faye + Some beautiful fabric by Nano Iro

Homemade Stickies

The nesting instinct has well and truly kicked in round our house and friends and charity shops have been striking lucky thanks to my current obsession with space and tidiness.  There are so many things I've hung onto but not looked at for an age including stacks of old magazines (which are now completely neglected thanks to pinterest). I was just about to chuck them in the recycling when I noticed all the cute images inside. A surprisingly cathartic evening in front of the TV with a pair of scissors later and Stevie had a big pile of pretty pictures to stick.  Her smile when I showed her what I'd done the next day was easily worth the time and she loved picking out her favorites to stick.

Easy Peasy Mark Making

Tip - Use a serving plate for the paint palette and add one colour at a time so it doesn't all go a lovely brown straight away!

Enjoy x

Christmas Ideas for the Tinies

clockwise from top left - quilted baby vest / wooden rain stick / bear paw mittens / cookie print all-in-one / cat poster / angel doll / puppy piano pull toy / bear hat / opposites book

Healthy Ice Cream... Whats not to love!

In our house ice-cream whether right or wrong is our biggest bargaining tool. It solves a million disputes and gets a lot of dinners eaten!

Luckily I have discovered a clever way to make healthy ice-cream. It's so easy to make and delicious too. The funny thing is after devouring bananas when small neither of my kids will eat them and Zeph is also funny about berries but when frozen and made into ice-cream all of a sudden they are fine!

All you need for a couple of ice creams is...

1 frozen banana

1 handful of another frozen fruit of your choice

some rice/almond/normal/soya milk

ice-cream cones

Chuck it all in the blender, whizz until smooth, pop into cones and hey presto silent happy children!

Some combinations we have tried

Banana and raspberry, aka the pink one

Banana and mixed berries, aka the purple one

Banana and pineapple, aka the yellow one

Banana, mango and almond (we put in a handfull of almonds) aka the nutty one

Happy ice-cream making xxx

Happiness is...

Jumping in puddles!

Watercolours For Toddlers

I had to think twice before posting this little tip - it's just so simple that it hardly seems worth it, but it is pretty handy, so for anyone who hasn't thought about it before here it is...

If you have a two year old like me who loves to paint then the quickest way is to set them up with a watercolour set. However, as I found, watercolour paints need LOTS of water, and my little one couldn't quite grasp the concept of putting water on the paint each and every time she went back for more, which led to a frustrated child asking for the 'big paint' - not always an option if you're in the middle of cooking dinner. So to get round this I poured a little pool of water on each pan of colour and voila, constant, vibrant paint with no chance of a water cup tipping, no mess and minimum cleaning up. Painting smock still firmly hanging in the cupboard, child amused for at least 20 mins and dinner on the table. It's a small victory but a good one! 

I picked up our watercolour set for a couple of pounds from Tiger

Rainy Day Muesli

As it was raining after school Zephy and I decided to make some muesli. A lovely afternoon was spent cutting, bashing, grinding, mixing and then tasting our wares.

To make muesli you can add whatever you fancy to oats. 

Our ingredients are as follows

a bag of jumbo rolled oats
a bag of porridge oats
a bag of dried apricots (expertly cut up by Zeph)
some sunflower,pumpkin and flax seeds (ground by Zeph)
some sultanas
soem almonds
some brazil nuts (bashed by zeph)

you could add
some toasted flakes
some goji berries
some cacoa nibs
some cashews
some dates

Zephy really enjoyed cutting the apricots, bashing the brazils and then mixing it all up and sinking his hands into the muesli and enjoying the feel of it slipping through his fingers.

We then decided we should probably try it so we had muesli for supper and both thought it was delicious....mmmmm.

Ottolenghi's Green Couscous

At the weekend we decided to take advantage of the amazing weather and headed for the beach for kids tea. Amongst the other goodies we packed this amazing green couscous from the book Plenty by Yotam Ottolenghi. It's a fab salad for hot summers day, just bursting with flavour. On the side we also had Tessa's Chicory leaves with freshly podded peas which are definitely our new addiction! 

Ottolenghi's Green Couscous

Serves 4

Ingredients

150g couscous
160ml boiling water or vegetable stock
1 small onion, thinly sliced
1 tbsp olive oil 1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground cumin
50g pistachios, shelled & toasted
3 spring onion, finely sliced
1 fresh green chilli, thinly sliced
30g rocket, chopped

Herb Paste
20g flat-leaf parsley
20g coriander
2 tbsp tarragon
2 tbsp dill
2 tbsp mint
90ml olive oil

Directions

Place couscous in a large bowl & add boiling water or stock. Cover the bowl with cling film & let it stand for 10 minutes. 

Meanwhile, heat the olive oil over a medium heat & add the onion. Saute for 10 minutes, stirring now & then until golden & soft. Add salt & cumin mix well & leave it to cool.

For the herb paste...
Place all ingredients in the bowl of a food processor & blitz until smooth. Add the herb paste to the couscous & mix it all together. Fluff it up with a fork. Add the cooked onion, pistachios, spring onions, green chilli & rocket & gently mix until well combined. Serve at room temperature.

Tessa's Chicory and fresh peas

serves 4-5 as a side

2 white or red chicory heads
a bag of freshly podded peas
2 big spoonfuls of capers

for the dressing
some olive oil
apple cider vinegar
(in equal measures)
a teaspoon of wholegrain mustard

Directions
Split the chicory heads into leaves with the peas and then add the capers.
Add the oil and vinegar together with the mustard and shake vigorously.
If taking to the beach don't dress the salad until you get there as the dressing makes the chicory soggy and its best lovely and crunchy.
Pears and a hard goats cheese are a great addition to this salad.